February 17 – Understanding the supply chain
The FCA’s Responsibilities of Providers and Distributors (RPPD) paper sets out guidance for firms around the fair treatment of customers. Although introduced in 2007, it articulated responsibilities already set out in the regulatory Principles, Rules and Guidance, financial services legislation and case law. During the consultation period there was broad consensus from the industry that […]
February 17 – Paying for others’ mistakes
In the last few weeks mortgage firms have been invoiced for the latest interim levy from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. These were for eye watering amounts of money. The background to the majority of these costs are failed unregulated investments. Some were to fund Eastern European property builds whilst others were on carbon credits, […]
February 17 – Is the mortgage market competitive enough?
The FCA has issued the terms of reference for its mortgage market study, which has been focussed more tightly since it issued its feedback statement in May 2016. The review will now revolve around the consideration of two key questions: At each stage of the consumer journey, do the available tools (including advice) help mortgage […]
February 17 – Cheesecake all round
The industry is about to descend into unseemly squabbles over the FCA proposals to reform the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. The pre-consultation discussions were characterised by goodwill, open minds and positive debate of the issues. Now we have tangible proposals on the table which firms and trade bodies can attach £s to, the debate suddenly […]
February 17 – Help to Buy and Lifetime ISAs
AMI has created a factsheet on Help to Buy ISAs and Lifetime ISAs which may be helpful for firms.
January 17 – Considered Choice
2017 has started with good news from Santander on procuration fees. For many years now intermediaries have been at the heart of the Santander mortgage business. In keeping with their developing automated solutions that allow customers to transact both directly or via an intermediary, paying a fee where the broker takes responsibility for the advice […]
January 17 – New Year, new beginnings?
The New Year has brought in a few changes to the mortgage market, including the Prudential Regulation Authority underwriting requirements on buy to let contracts and the end of the Help to Buy mortgage guarantee scheme. As a result we have seen some lenders increase their interest coverage ratio to higher than the minimum prescribed […]
December 16 – Equity Release – not a universal panacea
The world of equity release is evolving. With a new record lending total of £1.58bn to the end of Q3 in 2016, against a full year number of £1.71b in 2015, it looks likely that we will top £2bn for the first time this year. With new lending up 35% to £633.8m in Q3 itself, […]
December 16 – Ensuring the best of advice
A new debate has been added to the mortgage landscape recently. The volume of product transfer business being done directly by lenders is not included in Product Sales Data provided to the FCA and is not part of any statistics produced by the CML. This means that this activity is invisible. Current estimates are that […]
December 16 – Debt consolidation
AMI continues to have discussions with the FCA on debt consolidation around its expectations of firms. We have subsequently provided guidance for our members. A recent workshop highlighted the importance of record keeping as intermediaries and lenders need to be able to evidence why advice to consolidate debts is suitable and appropriate to a customer’s […]
